Decision Retreat – Advisor Overview

Written By 99 Day Novena

The Decision Retreat is a shortened version of St. Ignatius’ 30 day Spiritual Exercises. It features daily meditations from scripture, selections from the Ignatian Exercises and other materials to guide the candidate in recognizing and responding to the movements of God. The days usually involve four hourly meditations interspersed with times of rest and exercise. There are also aids to prayer and discernment in the Guide booklet they’ll use during their days of retreat.

The Retreat Advisor Role. Your role as the Advisor is to help the candidate hear the Lord. By this stage of the Novena you have good knowledge of the person’s spiritual disposition and habits of prayer. This is most valuable as you work with the retreat format laid out below. If this is your first time taking someone through, it’s best to follow the guidelines more intentionally. Even so, you are encouraged to prayerfully recognize needs as they emerge in the candidate and make adjustments that help her or him remain peacefully attentive to the movements of God. Some may need more structure and accountability to stay focused. Others may need encouragement to rest more and take breaks. Trustful openness to God, responsiveness to his leading – these are the conditions for discernment we hope to maintain. 

How long? 4 day or 8 day? As you read the description below, you’ll have a better idea of which to recommend. Most young people will find four days a long time, so this may be the best you can do if this is someone new to silent retreats. Be aware, though, that a shorter time-frame can limit the freedom and space necessary to make a good discernment. The decision part depends on the candidate’s openness to receive the Lord’s invitation, and sometimes it’s difficult to reach that point. Even after coming to a decision, there should be room in the schedule for confirmation. If it’s a four day, it’s wise for the Advisor to mentally budget time after the retreat – one or two meeting slots later that week – for the candidate to seek this confirmation for their chosen direction. There will usually be doubts, testing and second-guessing.

Why isn’t a weekend retreat sufficient? If you’re working with someone who has a demanding schedule, there’s a temptation to shorten the Decision retreat even further. While there can be situations where you as DA decide “this is all they can really do” and “something is better than nothing,” I encourage a balance between realism and responsible discernment. I’ve found weekend retreats – two days/two and a half days – to be inadequate. The person needs to really connect and be close with the Lord before they can approach their window of decision. That takes time and grace – time to hear the Lord and grace to respond. There will be experiences of spiritual consolation and desolation to be worked through. This patient wrestling is the necessary means by which their heart and mind receive the grace of understanding that leads to a clear and satisfactory choice. 

4 DAY DECISION RETREAT BOOK

Contains the daily meditation passages. Otherwise, it’s the same content as candidate’s

8 DAY DECISION RETREAT BOOK

Contains the daily meditation passages. Otherwise, it’s the same content as candidate’s

Decision Retreat Overview

Three parts: Awareness, Election and Confirmation

The central feature of the retreat is the decision, which is traditionally called making an election. The first part, Awareness, is intended to help the candidate enter trustingly into a prayerful openness to God. During this stage, encourage them to set aside the issue of discernment (“We’ll get to that later”) and just spend time with the Meditations. 

1. Awareness – When the candidate arrives, they’re usually somewhat distracted. The opening meditations are designed, therefore, to help them settle in and be open to the Lord’s loving presence. Remind the candidate: “As your Advisor, my role is to help you hear God.” As you accompany them, you’re guiding but you’re also being guided. Be prayerful and keep looking for signs as to whether conditions are becoming suitable for decision-making. The scripture meditations provided are supposed to move the candidate towards election/decision, but there is also space for adaptability as the retreat unfolds (you may feel led to substitute other passages as needed). God is full of surprises! This is his process and while the purpose is decision-making, we are attentive to the unexpected directions he may take us.  

Signs of good progress during the awareness phase could be described in four steps: 

A. Receptivity – the candidate transitions from distraction to initial knowledge of God’s presence, love and faithful provision.

B. Repentance – the candidate considers the state of her/his soul in light of God’s greatness and her/his own sin and its consequences. 

C. Realization – the candidates understands God’s mercy in a new or deeper way, considering her/his share in the grace flowing from the cross of Jesus Christ.

D. Response – the candidate is moved by a growing sense of gratitude for God’s action and feels led to make a suitable response. This is the Lord’s work, so we don’t ‘force’ the desired reaction, but we can encourage it as it begins to emerge. 

2. Election – The time of making a decision usually comes on the 3rd day of a 4 day retreat and on the 4th and 5th day of an 8 day retreat. In this way it overlaps with the end of the Awareness. It runs the span of a full day (the time between two consecutive daily meetings). At this time, the candidate is invited to review the Decision Preparation Worksheet they completed prior to the retreat and recall the primary inclination they have with regards to a celibate vocation. 

Ordinarily the time of election coincides with the 2 am Vigil focused on the Lord’s passion. This hour of intensive prayer recalls the Lord’s invitation to his disciples to “stay here and keep watch with me” (Mt. 26:38) in the Garden of Gethsemane. The purpose of this meditation is to awaken gratitude for the gift of salvation as well as stir the soul to great generosity in making a worthy response. This, combined with a growing awareness of what God is saying through spiritual consolations, should serve to bring the candidate to a place of freedom where he or she reaches the objective. The right conditions are present when she/he is able to say, in effect:

“God I believe you are calling me to do this (blank)…” 

Crossing the Rope Bridge

Please be advised: it rarely goes so smoothly! Why? I’ll offer an illustration. Imagine two friends on a mountain expedition. Both know there’s a difficult crossing to be made over a great ravine by way of a narrow, rope bridge. They’ve talked about it, planned for it and looked at maps in order to be ready. Only one friend, though, has made the journey before and, having crossed the bridge, knows what to expect.

Despite the careful preparation, once they come to the bridge, the inexperienced friend refuses to cross. The fearful sight of a flimsy span swaying over a chasm defies any description. Suddenly “discernment” takes a different route. Peaceful progress abruptly turns into confusion, refusal and redirection. Similarly, when decision time comes, we often uncover hidden resistance in a candidate that leads to a time of confusion. It may not be quite so dramatic, but the shift from trust to fear is evident. Please don’t be alarmed. This is part of the journey and a sympathetic view helps us respond well. The issue is usually control. 

When the decision about a life-state vocation – a binding commitment with lifelong consequences – was still far off and “theoretical,” it’s much easier to consider. Once it’s right in front of you, it suddenly appears more threatening, overwhelming or simply alien. “Not my thing!” the person may suddenly decide. You’ll know because the candidate becomes more restless or withdrawn or closed to your input. “I’ve made my mind up,” they might say, “I have peace about this. I don’t want to talk about it.” 

Here’s the way one experienced retreat guide, Br. Ken Apuzzo, explains it:

I think the biggest mistake people make when the time of election comes is they move from being in this position of receiving God’s grace in love, and it shifts towards them overthinking and trying to make this decision in a self-reliant way. It’s like they grab a hold of the steering wheel of the car (their life) from the Lord and they try to steer it. So they’ve moved out of the grace of receiving and into a place of trying to make something happen. They almost always fall into a desolation which makes it impossible, really, for them to make this decision.

A good Advisor can be a great blessing here, inviting the candidate back to a place of honesty and trust. Without accusing, you may simply point out the change, “I notice you’ve become more restless and out of peace (or closed off, etc.), can you describe how you reached these conclusions?”

If it seems, in fact, that the candidate is experiencing desolation – greater distance from God and resistance to his grace – invite them to return in prayer to any previous insights, especially those that came from spiritual consolations. Ask them to be as honest as they can be with themselves: Is that grace still at work? Does that insight still bring peace?

The goal is to help them reorient themselves to the Lord; to find their way back to a previous time of consolation and clarity. We want to help them “let go of the steering wheel” and resist the temptation to overthink the decision.

Try to communicate something like this:

What you’re doing is receiving God’s gift to you. This is his call for you to a lifelong way of loving. It’s something to accept, not to accomplish. You can’t grind it out in your will or work it out in your mind. It’s not some formula where “these pieces are all there and this adds up to this, and so that’s why I’m gonna do it…” No, it’s something that flows from God’s heart to your heart. Of course you need to understand clearly what a vocation is, but you don’t make a final election decision by analysis; by thinking it all through. You make it in a receptive, loving posture as a gift to be received.

A longer time of discernment allows for a buffer where all this can come about more peacefully. 

What kinds of decisions might they make?

Rethinking isn’t always wrong. Positive surprises may also be in store. In fact, there’s plenty of room for unexpected developments as you reach the decision-making stage. Here I’m talking about graced insights rather than distressing desolations. For example the person may not be ready to make a bigger decision about a vocational path, but the Lord can open up a different kind of ‘next good step.’ Maybe it’s the sense that the candidate should apply for a year of mission or service. It might be a call to finish grad school or accept a specific position in another city. Final answers are relatively rare in my experience. God is often content to plant seeds and offer clues. 

“What does the Lord want for me?” The patient obedience of the one who asks is part of God’s reply. He draws out our preparation and makes the searching part of the training. We learn to choose God’s will in the ordinary tasks of daily life. With time, the vocational question is simply the next step on a road of discovery well-traveled by the honest seeker. And despite the name of this Novena, there’s no timeline for this process. It certainly isn’t limited to 99 days!

To be clear, the decision may point to a celibate vocation, but it’s just as likely (more likely, I’d say) to lead somewhere else. It’s okay to have our opinions, especially since we’ve spent time with a particular candidate. But these should be held closely within and always subject to the authentic desire to hear and respond to God’s leading, primarily as it comes to the candidate through her or his own experience of spiritual consolations. It bears repeating that as Advisors, we are neutral pointers on the scales – that balance of decision. We’re open to what God says even and especially if it’s not beneficial to our own opinions or priorities as spiritual leaders. This is a pitfall especially for those of us tasked with promoting vocations in our diocese or religious communities. It’s worth the self-reminder: we’re co-discerners, not recruiters.

3. Confirmation – After making their preliminary election, there comes a period of time when the candidate “lives” with the decision. This part of the discernment process can either happen during or after the retreat. The 8 day format allows for this during the remaining days (another big advantage). With the 4 day retreat, however, the confirmation comes in the days and weeks that follow. 

A Time for Testing: To “Live-as-If”

In the case of a candidate who comes to a decision (accompanied by spiritual consolation) regarding a life-long vocation, they should take a week or two to live with the results. This kind of clarity is a great gift, but it’s still new. Like a seed in fertile soil, it needs to germinate. Therefore, it’s usually helpful to “leave them be,” that is, to allow space for the candidate to live in the reality of the call they’ve experienced. Don’t talk about it. Don’t share it with anybody. Advise them to get up and approach each day with an inward disposition that embraces the decision: “I am going to be living the rest of my life in this vocational call.” The purpose is to see what happens. Is there a growing sense that, yes, this is what God wants? If so, it is a confirmation of their decision. What does it mean, though, if the opposite happens? What if the decision to follow this vocational path becomes more frightening and the candidate becomes doubtful? 

Such doubts and fears are not necessarily a sign that the decision is a wrong one. In fact, there will almost certainly be temptations to doubt and desolations sent by the Enemy. The question is whether, overall, the weeks after the retreat produce a climate of confirmation rather than one of prolonged and deepening doubt. A few dips in the road are to be expected, but a permanent decline calls for more careful exploration. 

If things do take a darker turn and the candidate finds the weight of the decision becoming oppressive, what to do? Ignatius recommends a sort of ‘reverse discernment.’ He counsels the candidate to take the opposite position from their original election; that inwardly they live, for another week or two, as if they made the contrary decision instead. So if the original election was to enter seminary or religious postulancy, but this became plagued by grave doubts, the candidate can take time living with the decision NOT to enter. Does the darkness relent? Do they experience relief, clarity, joy? Such a change of feelings might alter the course of the decision, but take care to discern, as best you may, the source of the feelings. For example, a ‘feeling of peace,’ could be the result of spiritual consolation, but it might also be the result of settling for a more pleasing path. In sum, the question is not whether God has changed his mind (that’s not his way) but rather: Is there some further clarity the Lord wants to provide through his direct communication with the soul?  

The Desired Result. The Holy Spirit is the primary mover in this discernment. Have faith as the process unfolds. Even if clear results take some time, we trust him to speak and to resolve any doubts. The goal is for the candidate to emerge with a sense of direction, a reasonable awareness of ‘next steps,’ and a peaceful confidence that she or he is in the place that the Lord really wants.

The Decision Retreat itself – What to Look for as Advisor?

Your own familiarity with the principles of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, especially the Rules of Discernment, is a valuable resource as the retreat gets underway. If you know Ignatius well, you can skip or skim this explanation. If you’re fairly new or need a refresher, though, please continue to read. You don’t have to be an expert on Ignatius to successfully direct a Decision Retreat but the more you know, the better you’ll be able to guide.  

1. Foundation – St. Ignatius emphasizes from the start that the candidate’s success in discovering God’s will is a direct result of approaching our Lord with the right disposition. He frames this as the “First Principle and Foundation” – the clear conviction that we are created to know, love and serve the Lord. This desire to honor the God to whom we owe everything leads us to radical generosity. We are moved to do everything for the greater glory of God.

2. Attentiveness – Ignatian spirituality seeks “to find God in all things.” The Lord is seen as the primary agent of creation, redemption and, to the task at hand, discernment. This places God at center stage rather than in a sidelined deism. Before we seek him for our future, we become attentive to him in the present; that he is actively seeking us – awakening, inviting and calling us to himself. 

3. Motivation – “Ask for what you desire.” This is a frequent theme in Ignatian spirituality. It has two sides. On the one, we ask God to change our desires; to give us graced inclinations we don’t currently possess – for example, to want less wealth and more dependence on God. On the other, we ask for the grace to identify our own, deep-down desires. While God doesn’t always give us what we want, the ability to name and ask for this is a critical first step in discernment. It’s the “you are here” dot of decision-making. The underlying principle is that God has already been moving in the soul of the candidate. By inviting him or her to name specific desires, we open up avenues to explore, especially at the start of the retreat.

4. Imagination – Catholic spirituality allows for a range of Christ-centered meditation approaches – everything from imageless, wordless contemplation to descriptive, mental representation with clear images. The latter is where we locate Ignatian meditation. While the two approaches don’t need to be at odds with each other (doctors of the Church have endorsed both), imaginative meditation is the practice most called for by Ignatius. That said, every candidate will engage the material according to their own spiritual lights. If a person is less “image-oriented” in their prayer, you will have to help them recognize God’s movements based on wordless, imageless experiences. Trust the Holy Spirit to guide you both in this.

5. Consolation – The most important signs of God’s will are those felt in the soul by way of spiritual consolation. Ignatius gives ample guidance to help the candidate and Advisor recognize authentic movements of what he calls the “good spirit.” The point is to sift out and separate false good feelings – I feel good about doing this easy thing rather than that hard thing – from God-inspired good feelings – I want to make my life a total gift to God, no matter what he asks of me!” Only the Holy Spirit can inspire true spiritual consolation, so the object is to identify those uniquely powerful and compelling signs of God’s action and direction.

6. Repetition – This practice is explained in greater depth in the Retreat booklet, but here it’s worth noting the basic premise: spiritual consolations are like gifts that keep on giving. When the candidate experiences authentic movements of the good spirit, one defining characteristic is the on-going wealth of graces that flow from the encounter. By returning to an experience of consolation and praying again through the material or scripture passage that prompted it, the candidate may find further insight, inspiration or guidance. Such gifts are also subject to careful discernment since false consolations are always a possibility, but nevertheless they should be welcomed when they occur. 

Ignatian Spirituality – A Few Words of Advice

There are elements of Ignatian spirituality that may be difficult for modern minds. I’ll note three in particular. First, in composing his meditations, St. Ignatius drew freely from his own 16th century Castilian culture. That means the candidate will be asked to make considerable use of kingdom imagery (primarily in the 8 day format), complete with knights, battles, royal courts and sovereign rulers receiving submission. The second potential difficulty is the subject of sin and the real possibility of hell. The saint affirms the necessity of damnation for those who knowingly choose rebellion against God, and invites the candidate to meditate on this reality in a personal way. Most Catholics today have not been presented with God’s judgment in such stark terms, despite the fact that it fully aligns with Church teaching (CCC 1035f). The third potential obstacle is the more practical matter of using the imagination in prayer. In a media-saturated culture, the active application of the imagination for longer periods of time might be an under-developed skill that calls for patience and practice. 

 All these might be distracting to today’s discerner, but my advice is “stay the course.” In other words, be aware but don’t be afraid to present the material in its traditional (though abbreviated) form. This is based on years of pastoral experience and consistent positive results for candidates with varying levels of spiritual maturity. 

  • Regarding the images of kings and knights offering submission, modern minds are not so opposed to royal imagery as we might assume – consider all the kingdoms turning up in popular movies and series these days. If your candidate is strongly opposed to war and violence, or if submitting oneself to authority is a distasteful idea, don’t back away but invite self-reflection: “Why do I respond this way to these images?” 

  • Regarding the meditations on sin and judgment, look for a healthy engagement with the material. There may be risk of self-condemnation, but there is also great value in making the meaning of the cross more personal. If you detect signs of spiritual despair, remind the candidate of God’s great mercy.

  • Regarding the use of imagination, be ready to help. If you’re aware of reasons the candidate may find this especially difficult (for example if the person has been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder) it could be beneficial to discuss ways to vary the pattern of the daily meditations, as needed, to aid the full use of their imagination. For example, taking short “brain breaks” within the hours of prayer or changing locations (like being in the chapel and then the garden and then being back in their room) for various stages of the day or even doing some meditations while walking. Creative flexibility can win the day if you’re dealing with someone inexperienced with making a silent retreat.  

 As you navigate these various potential obstacles, I want to draw your attention to the articles provided in the retreat materials which are intended to help. Read them in advance and make summary notes to yourself in the margins that can guide you back to useful sections when the candidate hits relevant difficulties.

Retreat FAQ’s

About fasting. While some amount of fasting can be beneficial, the priority is for the candidate to be “on their game” for the daily Meditations. Fasting can work, for example, during the time of election, at least the day before, ending with breakfast on Day 5. A better approach is to keep meals simple and avoid unnecessary snacking in between.

About using a house other than a retreat house (for example renting an Airbnb or borrowing a friend’s beach/lake house). For various reasons, the candidate may not have access to a retreat house. Though it’s not ideal, a borrowed or rented residence can be suitable provided the location allows for real solitude and silence. Discuss ways of minimizing distractions, for example confirm that there will be nobody else coming or going from the house, there will be no use of video or audio media unless it’s part of the retreat itself. Work out ways of establishing patterns in the day (consistent wake up and prayer times, daily Mass options in the vicinity, shopping in advance to avoid periodic trips to the store, simplicity of food prep, etc.)

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